Lesson Plan: Iconic Imagery of the Vietnam War Grade level: 8-12 Time: Lesson is adaptable for one or more 50-90-minute class periods. Subjects with which this lesson interfaces: History, Civics, Government, Journalism, Photography, Communications Content Advisory: The imagery included herein depicts graphic scenes of violence from the Vietnam War. While appropriate for high school and college-aged students, teachers are advised to exercise caution before adapting this lesson for younger grades. Materials needed: • Access to the Internet (with sound) for showing audio-visual files • Overhead projector to display the Internet video clips • Class copies of Photo Analysis Worksheet Handouts #1-3 (attached below) Essential Questions: • How can a photograph define or misrepresent an event in the historical record? • In what ways did photo-journalism affect the course of the Vietnam War? • Does the existence of journalists in a war zone help or harm a war effort? Learning Outcomes: • Identify iconic images from the Vietnam War • Apply evidentiary skills and analysis • Understand the role of photojournalism in a democracy • Develop an argument for and against free journalism in war zones • Draw conclusions and make hypotheses applicable to modern-day contexts Summary: Students evaluate three iconic photographs and events of the Vietnam War, as broadcast to the United States in 1963, 1968 and 1972, respectively. Analyzing the news events using primary and secondary historical sources ---textual facts, still photography and film footage--- students weigh the merits and detriments of publicizing dramatic war scenes through mass media. After placing the imagery in context with major turning points of the Vietnam War, students consider independent journalism’s impact on policy- makers, military strategists and public opinion. Copyright © 2016 Peace Works Travel. All Rights Reserved. www.peaceworkstravel.com Biography of an Image: Handout #1A Self-Immolation of Buddhist Monk, Thich Quang Duc, Streets of Saigon, 1963 Photographer: Malcolm Browne, Associated Press Photographic Award: World Press Photo of the Year, 1963; Pulitzer Prize, 1963. You Tube Video of Historical Event (5 minutes, 15 seconds) “Protesta Silenciosa: Thich Quang Duc” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwsomcfQElY&feature=player_embedded#! Photo: Malcome Browne, AP NOTES: Copyright © 2016 Peace Works Travel. All Rights Reserved. www.peaceworkstravel.com Biography of an Image: Handout #1B General Nguyen Ngoc Loan executing a Viet Cong prisoner in Saigon, 1968 Photographer: Eddie Adams, Associated Press Photographic Awards: World Press Photo of the Year, 1968; Pulitzer Prize, 1969 You Tube Video of Historical Event (3 minutes, 2 seconds) “Vietnam Execution” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGrsw6m9UOY Photo: Eddie Adams, AP NOTES: Copyright © 2016 Peace Works Travel. All Rights Reserved. www.peaceworkstravel.com Biography of an Image: Handout #1C “The Girl in the Picture, Kim Phuc” 1972 Photographer: Nick Ut, Associated Press Photographic Awards: World Press Photo of the Year, 1972; Pulitzer Prize, 1972 You Tube Video of Historical Event (1 minute, 32 seconds) “Vietnam Napalm” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ev2dEqrN4i0 Photo: Nick Ut, AP NOTES: Copyright © 2016 Peace Works Travel. All Rights Reserved. www.peaceworkstravel.com STUDENT Photo Analysis Worksheet Handout #2 1. Describe the photograph. Who is the photographer and subject? 2. List the emotions this photograph makes you feel: 3. If you already know the historical context of this picture, explain why this event occurred: 4. If you do not know the historical context of this picture, explain what you think occurred: 5. With whom does this picture make you sympathize? Why? 6. Do you view this image and conclude that someone --an individual, a government, an army-- is at fault for the harm depicted? Why/ Why not? If so, who? Using Explanatory Photo Facts Handout #3, read the primary and secondary reports of the image. 7. Explain how additional details from textual reporting give this photograph greater meaning. Does this image offer a complete story of the facts? Copyright © 2016 Peace Works Travel. All Rights Reserved. www.peaceworkstravel.com 8. What historical facts are missing from this photograph that cannot be captured on camera? Does the omission of these facts make the image a misrepresentation of reality? Watch the You Tube film footage video clip of this event 9. Which do you think is a more powerful story-teller: the video, the text, or the image itself? Why? Which form of documentary evidence is the most accurate? 10. Argue that this photo is helpful or unhelpful in educating about the Vietnam War: Photo helped educate public about Vietnam Photo misled the public about Vietnam Copyright © 2016 Peace Works Travel. All Rights Reserved. www.peaceworkstravel.com 11. Make an argument that this photo is a help or a hindrance to the United States’ military and political goals in the Vietnam War: Photo helped U.S. military and political goals Photo hindered U.S. military and political goals 12. Using the historical reaction to this photograph as your factual support, explain how U.S. Constitutional guarantees of freedom of the press and speech encourage citizens to be informed and engaged with world events: Explanatory Photo Facts: Handout #3A Self-Immolation of Buddhist Monk, Thich Quang Duc, Streets of Saigon, 1963 Photographer: Malcome Browne, Associated Press Explanatory Facts: • Thich Quang Duc, a sixty-six year old Buddhist monk self-immolated in the streets of Saigon on June 11, 1963. The martyrdom was an act of protest against the brutal crackdown on Buddhists led by the U.S-backed regime of Ngo Dinh Diem in S. Vietnam. • Photographs of the event were circulated around the world and increased pressure on both the U.S. policy-makers and the Diem regime for change in their governance of S. Vietnam. • Malcome Browne’s image helped discredit and marginalize the Diem regime, raise questions about the U.S. involvement in Vietnam, and set in motion the November 1963 coup d’état which left both Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother, Ngo Ninh Nhu dead. Primary Accounts of the self-immolation: Copyright © 2016 Peace Works Travel. All Rights Reserved. www.peaceworkstravel.com 1. -immolation were documented in a letter he had left: Đức's last words before his self “Before closing my eyes and moving towards the vision of the Buddha, I respectfully plead to President Ngô Đình Diệm to take a mind of compassion towards the people of the nation and implement religious equality to maintain the strength of the homeland eternally. I call the venerables, reverends, members of the sangha and the lay Buddhists to organise in solidarity to make sacrifices to protect Buddhism.” 2. David Halberstam of the New York Times, reported an eye-witness account of the event in his 1965 book, “The Making of a Quagmire.” “I was to see that sight again, but once was enough. Flames were coming from a human being; his body was slowly withering and shriveling up, his head blackening and charring. In the air was the smell of burning human flesh; human beings burn surprisingly quickly. Behind me I could hear the sobbing of the Vietnamese who were now gathering. I was too shocked to cry, too confused to take notes or ask questions, too bewildered to even think ... As he burned he never moved a muscle, never uttered a sound, his outward composure in sharp contrast to the wailing people around him.” P.211 3. Madame Nhu (Wife of the Secret Police , Ngo Ninh Nhu, brother to Ngo Dinh Diem) remarks about the self-immolation, 1963: “What have the Buddhist leaders done comparatively? The only thing they have done is barbecue one of their monks. Whom they have intoxicated, whom they have abused the confidence. Even that barbequing was not done with self-sufficient means because they used imported gasoline… Let them burn, and we shall clap our hands.” Copyright © 2016 Peace Works Travel. All Rights Reserved. www.peaceworkstravel.com Explanatory Photo Facts: Handout #3B General Nguyen Ngoc Loan executing a Viet Cong prisoner in Saigon, 1968 Photographer: Eddie Adams, Associated Press Analytical/Primary Accounts of the Saigon Execution: 1. Writer and Critic David D. Perlmutter writes of the Saigon Execution image: “No film footage did as much damage as AP photographer Eddie Adams's 35mm shot taken on a Saigon street ... When people talk or write about the Tet Offensive at least a sentence is devoted (often with an illustration) to the Eddie Adams picture.” 2. On General Nguyen Ngoc Loan and his famous photograph, Adams wrote in Time Magazine “The general killed the Viet Cong; I killed the general with my camera. Still photographs are the most powerful weapon in the world. People believe them; but photographs do lie, even without manipulation. They are only half-truth if you were the general at that time and place on that hot day, and you caught the so-called bad guy after he blew away one, two or three Americans. ... What people?” the photograph didn't say was, 'What would you do 3. Stanley Karnow, Author of Vietnam: A History writes p. 529 “But the most memorable image of the upheaval in Saigon—and one of the most searing spectacles of the whole war – was imprinted the next day on a street corner in the city. General Nguyen Ngoc Loan, chief of South Vietnam’s national police was the crude cope who had brutally crushed the dissident Buddhist movement….Now his mood was even fiercer: Communist invaders had killed several of his men, including one gunned down with his wife and children in their house…That morning, Eddie Adams, an Associated Press photographer had been cruising around the shattered town. Near the An Quang temple, they sported a patrol of government troops with a captive in tow. He wore black shorts and a checkered sports shirt and his hands were bound behind him.